


silence in between what i thought and what i said

by spock



Category: Animal Kingdom (TV)
Genre: (Slightly), Canon Compliant, Dom/sub Undertones, Domestic, Established Relationship, Light Angst, M/M, One-Sided Relationship, Pre-Series, Relationship Study, Rough Kissing, Roughhousing, Unreliable Narrator, Vacation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-18
Updated: 2016-07-18
Packaged: 2018-07-24 16:25:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,393
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7515079
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spock/pseuds/spock
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>If it were up to him, they'd stay forever. </p><p>But, as with all things when it comes to Adrian, it isn't.</p>
            </blockquote>





	silence in between what i thought and what i said

**Author's Note:**

> [prompt:](http://fic-promptly.dreamwidth.org/443876.html?thread=13929444#cmt13929444)
>
>> any, any, "pretend I'm someone you like"

There's a good fifty feet between the drag-pull of the waves to the straw mat sat outside their back door. In the time it's taken Deran to escape one and walk to the other, the sun's done its best to dry the surf from his skin, picking up where the already warm waters had started it's daily effort to bake him from the outside in. He's pushed his wetsuit down to his hips, water dribbling like a shadow and staining little pinpricks into the ground in his wake. 

He doesn't bother being quiet when opens the door and he steps into the kitchen, scratches absentmindedly at his chest as he stares at Adrian's back where he's stood at the cooking range, stirring something on the stove one-handedly as he thumbs at his phone with the other, the rest of him completely still. 

Deciding to forgo their usual argument, Deran pushes his suit the rest of the way down, leaving it next to the door as he breaches the gap between Adrian and himself, stalking across the wooden floor completely naked until he's pressed up tight against Adrian's back. He snakes both of his hands down the front of Adrian's shorts and lets his fingers skim through the thatch of hair until the tips graze the curves of Adrian's thighs. 

"How was it out there?" Adrian asks him. 

Deran noses behind Adrian's ear, burying his face into the back of Adrian's head. "Choppy." 

He frees one hand out from Adrian's waistband and slides it up to rest against his stomach instead, pressing against his abdominals. Adrian's wearing Deran's shirt, a cheap white cotton thing that'd came in a pack of three. They're basically the same size, save that Deran's a bit wider in the shoulders, which means that the shirt just barely slips down one of Adrian's, showing freckled skin that's stretched taught over bone. 

He closes his eyes and gives Adrian a good squeeze, trying to hold on to this moment, appreciate its tangiblility, burn it into his mind so that even on his death bed he'll be able to recall it with crystal clarity. 

As a teenager _this_ — this exact thing — was his greatest fantasy: hitting up the beach whenever he pleased, far, far away from his mother and siblings with a guy who's just as happy to let Deran cuddle up to him and hold his soft cock as he is to shove it down Deran's throat when it's hard. The silence hangs between them and he adds, "I think it'll probably storm this afternoon." 

Adrian hums and hits the button that has his phone's screen blinking dark. He raises and twists his arm up until a corner of it presses against Deran's lips. 

Deran sighs and opens his mouth, awkwardly using his lips and teeth to find traction on the smooth glass. Both hands free, Adrian continues to stir at his pot, picking up the handle and moving it off the lit burner onto an unused one. He leans to the right to grab a lime he's already halved and Deran totters with him, unwilling to be disentangled. He watches as Adrian squeezes it into the soup he's made, seeds and all. 

Adrian loves Asian food. Deran likes to eat. 

"What is it?" His question is lost, words coming out awkward from how he can't risk moving his tongue or lips and dropping the phone. He whines when Adrian turns to face him, forcing Deran to shift his hands so that he ends up with one settled low on Adrian's back while the other palms a handful of his ass. 

Adrian pulls the phone from his mouth and stuffs it into the left pocket of his sweats. "Try that again?"

"What did you make?" He says the words slowly, like Adrian's stupid, just to get a rise out of him, make Adrian's nose scrunch up like it always does when he's pissed. Deran isn't left feeling disappointed. 

"Tom Yum Talay." Deran understands none of those words and he's sure it shows on his face. Adrian rolls his eyes. "The sour soup you like, with the shrimp."

Deran starts to grin, slow and slightly arrogant, digging his fingers into the soft curve of Adrian's ass. "You're too good to me."

"Don't I fucking know it." Adrian's looking back at him with the dubious expression he always seems ready to pull out for Deran, like it's never far from his mind that he could do a million times better than shacking up with his sorry ass. Thing is, that thought is hardly ever out of Deran's mind either, and he really fucking wished that Adrian wasn't so keen to rub it in his face. 

He shifts them sideways until Adrian's stood in front of a corner of the counter without anything on it, slipping his hand out from the back of Adrian's pants and then bodily lifting him up to sit on the counter. Adrian's expression hasn't changed at all, but his breathing has picked up slightly. 

"Hey," he says, practically barking the word out, pulls a dark look onto his face, one that he clued-in very early into their days of hooking up as one that worked particularly well for getting Adrian from zero to sixty in practically no time at all. He's always been an asshole, no doubt about it, but he's not... _this_. For Adrian, though, he's always been willing to play the part if it means it'll keep him sticking around. "Pretend I'm someone you actually fucking like, huh?"

Adrian shudders once, full bodied, and then looks at Deran, seems to really see him, takes in how he's standing naked it the early afternoon light. Deran's always been fit but it's only been the past six months or so that he's actually worked on looking cut, dropping his body fat so that all his muscles stand out in stark relief. He does it just for this, the way Adrian's looking at him now, like he can't believe Deran's real. 

He places his hands on Deran's chest and then slides them both up up _up_ — over his pecks, the tendons in Deran's neck, along his jaw, finally letting them settle in his hair, one gripping a handful at the nape of his neck, the other tucking wayward strands behind Deran's ears. It's the look in his eyes, the gentle touch of his work-rough hands on his skin, that has Deran's dick starting to stand to attention. 

"And why should I do that?" Adrian sounds as if he couldn't care either way, his mood as temperamental as the sea even on a good day when it comes to Deran. Deran's heart stutters in his chest, hurt and anger settling down inside of him. He wants to snap back but holds his tongue, biting it between his teeth to keep his big, stupid mouth shut. 

Adrian's been mentioning the need to get back to the real world, return to work. He says that he can't afford to stay on vacation forever and waves off every attempt Deran makes to offer his own money. The dread he'd finally shaken for the first time in his life has started to settle in back over his shoulders this past week, the fear of going back to Smurf, wondering just how in the hell he's supposed to be the Deran his family knows after he's had _this_ — after he's lived and breathed everything he's ever wanted out of life for nearly two months now, long enough that this feels more like real life than what they're vacationing from. 

If it were up to him, they'd stay forever. 

But, as with all things when it comes to Adrian, it isn't. 

So he psyches himself up and lets a mean look slide onto his face, pulls one corner of his lips upward in a smirk he doesn't actually feel and surges forward to bite at Adrian's lips when all he really wants to do is worship them instead. Deran licks into his mouth, aggressive and fast. Adrian's head snaps back and he brains himself on the cupboard, breath hitching in his throat and dick going from half-mast to pitching a tent in the time it takes Deran to blink. 

Deran drops to his knees and gets to work on giving Adrian a reason to keep on pretending.

**Author's Note:**

> this is all crapyouknowme's fault! i always deliver though, so here you go, friend. 
> 
> i wanted to play around with all the unknowns and hinted things we've been shown about their relationship, and what kind of dynamic would have to exist to make it sustainable for as long as they've been not-together (tl;dr ...is deran a service top???). so i figured belize would be the perfect place to peek into their dynamic, because honestly, what in the hell happened in belize that had them still being together (and monogamous??) two years later???


End file.
